TN: 2000 Mondotte-Bellisle St. Emilion

[finner]

The '00 Mondotte-Bellisle is not that impressive. Some cherry, earth, licorice, and a touch of bandaid on the nose. Fairly lean at midpalate, with a short finish. I guess I was expecting more - it did not show the characteristic concentration and layering of the vintage.

[JimHow]

Thanks for the report, finner. It just goes to show that, as great as the 2000 vintage was, in the end the limitations of terroir take over. I've had similar experiences with a couple other 2000 St. Emilions, Ferrand Lartigue and Corbin. You get the impression that these wines were stretched as far as they could go in 2000, but they just didn't rise to the level of anything profound.

[finner]

Yeah Jim, I'm hearing you. I had a 2000 La Tour St. Bonnet a few weeks ago that was light and airy, lackluster. IIRC, the pundits were saying that you could not have hoped for better weather throughout the 2000 vintage and harvest, so I guess it came down to other limitations like region and classification. It could be that 2005 will be a better across-the-board vintage than 2000, but that remains to be seen. I think I'm going to backfill on some more 2005's.